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Crime and drugs bring renewed attention to Denver's Civic Center park

A man walks past a variety of people gathered at Civic Center, which is near the large public-transportation hub at Broadway and Colfax Avenue, allowing easy access for the down-and-out. (Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post)

The City and County Building provides a backdrop for diners and food trucks lined up during lunchtime recently at Civic Center. (Photos by Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post)

Six years ago, Denver went all out to jump-start a Civic Center renaissance, envisioning a manicured green space busy with ordinary people enjoying strolls, brown-bag lunches, after-school soccer games and evening concerts, instead of the transients, hookers and drug dealers who infused the downtown park with a sinister vibe. But despite more than $15 million spent to reclaim the park, the perception of danger has not disappeared.

Midday fitness classes filled with downtown office workers exercise near the balustrade wall, widely regarded as virtually an open-air drug market. Patrons of food trucks that line the center of the park at lunchtime on summer Tuesdays and Thursdays compete for bench space with men passed-out drunk.

Fitness trainer Chris Vafeades, center, leads participants in her boot camp in a run past a vagrant on a bench at Civic Center last month.

All these seem minor compared with a shootout Thursday afternoon steps from the park on East Colfax Avenue. No one was injured. Three men were arrested. But dozens of people — as well as busloads of school kids — were unnerved.

The park is positioned for success, he thinks, with both great bone structure of architectural design and the public-private partnership of a conservancy that led to the rebirth of parks in other cities.

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The problems at Civic Center, he said, "are very reversible."

But like most experts in the national movement to revitalize urban parks, Birnbaum cautions that change is slow.

"Places need to hit a tipping point, not just with programming but with changing perception," he said. "The perception of safety is a big issue."

Those who live and work near Civic Center, however, feel the issue is urgent. Problems of homelessness and drug addiction have spilled over into nearby neighborhoods.

"We wear gloves and rake our gardens before we pull weeds because of all the syringes," said Robin Lima, who with her husband, Jack, has for 30 years owned the Native American Trading Company at 13th and Bannock streets, a block from the southwest end of the park.

Homeless people sleep on their porch and "use the back of the store as a toilet," Lima said.

As business owners, the Limas are concerned not only about personal safety but with the image visitors see.

"A woman from Paris came in one day and said the (Clyfford) Still Museum was wonderful, but she didn't feel safe in the neighborhood," Lima said. "I'm concerned that tourists like that will go back home and tell people."

Crime rates are on the rise in Civic Center — with 445 reported crimes from January through June, up about 35 percent from 330 during the same period in 2012.

Office workers and other professionals visiting the park have stumbled over people shooting heroin in the Greek Theater, the Voorhies Memorial and the portable toilets.

A few years ago, "Civic Center had greatly improved," said Lindy Eichenbaum Lent, executive director of the Civic Center Conservancy, who credits the Better Denver bond initiative and new activity programming for starting a turnaround. "But then Occupy Denver brought a permanent encampment there, which really shifted the paradigm and created a precedent, and a gathering place, that we are in many ways still recovering from."

When high-profile incidents of violence happen, fingers frequently point at cops.

But what ails Civic Center can't be solved by police work alone, experts say.

The Denver Police Department worked with Parks and Recreation to install 14 police-monitored security cameras. District 6, which includes Civic Center, has also added off-duty police 13 hours every day, in addition to ongoing law enforcement by mounted patrols, bicycle patrols, squad cars and undercover patrols.

"We lock people up left and right," said Tony Lopez, Denver commander of District 6. "But there are so many different layers to this issue."

"Anybody coming into downtown on Greyhound who doesn't have a place to stay knows this is where you can get your needs met," he said.

More surveillance cameras aren't enough, he said. "We need to deal with the bigger problem. Many of these kids can't get housing or the health care they need for things like mental health issues. People have no place to stay and no employment."

A Civic Center safety summit was convened June 3, with people including representatives from the mayor's office, Denver Environmental Health, Downtown Denver Partnership, the district attorney's office, Denver's Road Home and Denver Human Services.

The solution, they agreed, must be multifaceted — rooted in seven areas: social services; maintenance; programming of activities; infrastructure; legal enforcement and prosecution; resources; and community and political will.

Judge John Marcucci, presiding judge of the Denver County Court, and Assistant City Attorney Chris Gaddis attended the meeting, and discussion included a new tool called "area restrictions," Councilwoman Jeanne Robb said.

Area restrictions ban repeat offenders — those who frequent certain areas and are known to narcotics officers or other members of the police department — from returning to the area, according to Lynn Kimbrough, spokeswoman for the Denver DA's office. Civic Center and the Golden Triangle both have area restrictions, she said.

"Like a recipe, it's a combination of ingredients that make the dish good or bad," he said. "It's law enforcement along with redesign, programming, residential and drug treatment — things all happening in concert to mutually reinforce each other."

Civic Center is near the large public-transportation hub at Broadway and Colfax Avenue, which allows easy access for the down-and-out.

"(Some churches) have a missionary-type spirit, and they want to go into the field to really help these guys," Kelly said. "But that tends to aggravate certain other things. (People) who hang out and get high think, 'We don't really have to go outside our 'hood to get fed, because we got the convenience of them coming to us.' "

The current situation has triggered caution even in the social-service community.

"It's become more and more challenging to keep outreach workers safe when they go there," said Kim Easton, CEO of Urban Peak, which works with homeless youths. "We don't send them down alone anymore."

Fights among the groups can flare up in an instant, even in late morning, as happened one recent Wednesday, with young men running in from different points of the park to join the fracas.

Even the most committed supporters of Civic Center's revitalization are frustrated by the stubborn problems, but they see progress in things such as bike-in movie night and fitness activities.

Lent said she recently visited Broadway Terrace after an afternoon boot-camp class in the park — and liked what she saw.

"I went over 30 minutes after they left," Lent said, "and there was a group of people doing yoga, and a group of young professionals playing touch football, and some others having a picnic. That fitness class made Broadway Terrace a more inviting, safer place, which speaks to the power of programming."

Lent says the city has done well with its planning and construction of Civic Center buildings that house institutions of art, government and culture.

"But the question for us, as a community, is how the spaces between those buildings will enhance our quality of life, uphold our values and uplift our community," she said.

Pockets of criminal activity exist in various places in Denver, she said, "but how can we have respect for rule of law if we tolerate criminal activity in the shadow of the state Capitol, the City and County Building, the art museum and the business district?"

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